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‘C.S.I.’ Gets a New Financial Partner

March 7, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Content Partners, a financial boutique that buys the future cash flow due stars and others from their screen and musical work, said on Wednesday that it had agreed to acquire the half of “C.S.I.” owned by an affiliate of Goldman Sachs in a deal that makes it a co-owner, with CBS, of the long-running series and its spinoffs.

Terms were not disclosed. But it was reported that Goldman had sought more than $400 million for the 50 percent interest.

Goldman’s GS Capital Partners investment arm had acquired the stake through its purchase, in 2007, of an interest in Alliance Atlantis, a Canadian entertainment company. Early this year, GS Capital Partners and others sold the Alliance Films unit to Canada’s Entertainment One.

As co-owner of the series, Content Partners will now own half of the production company revenue from old episodes, as they continue to be sold abroad or through home entertainment and other media, and from future episodes, as they are created.

When completed, the “C.S.I.” transaction will become the largest purchase for Content Partners. The company was created in 2006 by Steven H. Kram, a former William Morris Agency chief operating officer who is now the Content Partners chief executive, and Steven E. Blume, who was previously chief financial officer of the Brillstein-Grey management company. The entrepreneur Todd Wagner and the investor Paul Wachter are among its partners, and Mr. Wachter helped structure the current deal, Mr. Kram said.

“This proves the value of liquidity in an uncertain economic environment,” Mr. Kram added. He spoke recently by telephone of his company’s ability to use resources from its investors and lenders to buy an asset of the kind that is usually owned by large media companies. Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase provided financing for the purchase, he said.

Leslie Moonves, the president and chief executive of CBS, declined to comment.

For more than a decade, the “C.S.I.” franchise has been among the most profitable of television properties. According to the firm Media Metrics, the original “C.S.I.,” which is now in its 13th year on CBS, was the most-watched television show in the world last year, the fifth time in the last seven years that it has earned that ranking. And in one of those years, its spinoff, “C.S.I. Miami,” was the most-watched show. The worldwide audience for the original “C.S.I.” has frequently surpassed 70 million.

While “C.S.I. Miami” was canceled last year, the original and “C.S.I.: N.Y.” remain on the air. The latter is considered a show “on the bubble,” which means this could be its final season. But the original “C.S.I.” still generally wins its 10 p.m. Wednesday time period, and even after 13 years, averages 11.2 million viewers a week. A 14th season is all but certain.

In terms of historical value, the “C.S.I.” franchise, which includes 724 one-hour episodes, is almost surely at or near the top among television series, having generated billions in profits. That outcome makes it one of television’s cautionary tales because the show was originally the property of the Walt Disney Company, which walked away from ownership in the series when it landed at CBS. At the time, some Disney executives did not believe shows on CBS could attract the kind of young viewers needed to be successful.

CBS needed a last-minute partner to pay half the production costs before “C.S.I.” could go on the air. Alliance Atlantis became that company and gained a half share in one of the greatest gold mines in entertainment history.

By the nature of its business, Content Partners has been an unusually quiet operator in Hollywood. Mr. Kram declined to identify individuals who had sold interests to the company, or which titles were among the 119 movies and five television series to which it now holds rights.

Sellers to Content Partners, Mr. Kram said, receive cash from their work immediately, rather than waiting years for revenue to arrive from television, video and Internet sales. Mr. Kram and his partners profit when they bet correctly on the future value of entertainment.

The newly purchased stake, he said, does not include revenue participations that may be owed to the “C.S.I.” stars or creators, whose ranks include the producer Jerry Bruckheimer. Such rights are still owned by actors or others and are not part of the production companies’ share of revenue.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/07/business/media/csi-gets-a-new-financial-partner.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Media Business Tagged With: , ,

Advertising: Seacrest Buys Marketing Agency to Expand Reach

December 5, 2012 by Leave a Comment

The acquisition, to be announced on Wednesday, reflects Mr. Seacrest’s plan to build a diversified media company on the back of his many day jobs, which include hosting Fox’s “American Idol” and radio shows for Clear Channel. In a telephone interview, he said of the acquisition, “Part of my overall goal in the business is to connect content, brands and consumers. I think that this is a great opportunity to do that.”

Mr. Seacrest already has his own marketing deals. One with Ford Motor resulted in a campaign this year called “Random Acts of Fusion.” Mr. Seacrest is the M.C. for the campaign, appearing in online videos, commercials and Twitter messages.

Mr. Seacrest said he saw more such partnerships on the horizon. Showing up on camera, though, is not the main point of the deal with Civic Entertainment. He said the company’s co-founders, Stuart Ruderfer and David Cohn, would continue to run the company independently in New York.

“They’ll do what they do best,” he said, while he will tap into his connections across industries.

He could, theoretically, line up some of the celebrities he interviews on the radio, or some of the reality stars whose shows he produces for the E! channel, for an event put together by Civic.

Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. It was conducted through Mr. Seacrest’s new personal investment arm, the Seacrest Global Group, not through an investment fund set up this year by the majority investors in Clear Channel, THL and Bain Capital. That fund, with up to $300 million in commitments, is seeking bigger investments than the one Mr. Seacrest made in Civic.

Mr. Seacrest called the deal the first “of what I hope to be many,” citing an interest in creating a very diversified portfolio.

Mr. Ruderfer said he and Mr. Cohn had been talking with Mr. Seacrest for a few months. “Ryan has a very unique vision for building a new media and entertainment model, and we’re extremely excited to partner up with him on doing that,” he said.

Mr. Ruderfer added, “I think a lot of people have aspired to bring Hollywood together with excellent marketing services. I think this is genuinely fulfilling that promise, and it’s genuinely new in that way,”

Civic, which has 45 employees, has been behind prominent campaigns for clients like CNN, NBC, HBO, AE, and the National Football League. It specializes in so-called experiential marketing, which is based on people going to places or events.

For example, for HBO’s “The Pacific,” the company helped organize a wreath-laying ceremony for war veterans at the World War II Memorial in Washington. For Southwest Airlines, it helped set up a bar and lounge called the Southwest Porch in Bryant Park in New York City. For the History channel’s “Swamp People,” it planted alligators and cypress trees inside the city’s Chelsea Market. It produced a series of restaurant spaces for CNN, the CNN Grill, at the Republican and Democratic conventions and the SXSW technology conference.

Some of its work has involved creating content, a growing area for big brands like the N.F.L., which commissioned Civic to come up with a plan for its Facebook and Twitter pages. For NBC News, Civic helped devise Education Nation, a series of summit meetings that has attracted well-known speakers and has become an annual event.

Something like Education Nation “enhances the brand of NBC News,” Mr. Ruderfer said.

Steve Capus, the president of NBC News, said Mr. Ruderfer and Mr. Cohn had brought “great contacts and great energy” to Education Nation.

Mr. Capus is also a fan of Mr. Seacrest, whose wide-ranging pact with NBC, announced in April, made him a special correspondent on the “Today” show. Mr. Capus said, “I think it’s going to be a terrific pairing.”

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/05/business/media/seacrest-buys-marketing-agency-to-expand-reach.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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Google Looks for the Next Google

July 20, 2011 by Leave a Comment

In the hottest market for technology start-up companies in over a decade, the Silicon Valley behemoth is playing venture capitalist in a rush to discover the next Facebook or Zynga.

Other pedigreed tech companies are doing the same, as venture capital dollars coming from corporations approach levels last seen in the dot-com bubble era of 2000.

To some, it is a telltale sign of an overheated industry, symptomatic of a late and ill-advised rush to invest during good times. But Google says it has a weapon to guide it in picking investments — a Google-y secret sauce, which means using data-driven algorithms to analyze the would-be next big thing.

Never mind that there often is very little data because the companies are so young, and that most venture capitalists say investing is more of an art than a science. At Google, even art is quantifiable.

“Investing is being in a dark room and trying to find the way out,” said Bill Maris, the managing partner of Google Ventures, the corporate investment arm. “If you have a match, you should light it.”

Corporate venture funds invested $583 million in start-ups in the first three months of the year, according to the National Venture Capital Association, up from $443 million in the same period last year and $245 million in 2009, before tech investing began its rapid turnaround.

Today, 10 percent of venture capital dollars comes from corporations, nearing the previous bubble-era high of 15 percent in 2000. Facebook, Zynga and Amazon.com are investing in social media start-ups. AOL Ventures restarted last year after three previous efforts, and Intel Capital expects to invest more this year than the $327 million it invested last year.

Google Ventures says it has invested as much money in the first half of this year as in all of last, and Larry Page, the company’s co-founder, who became chief executive this spring, has promised to keep the coffers wide open.

Corporate venture arms have sprung into action before during boom times, like the early 1980s and the late 1990s, but they have had mixed records.

“When the corporate guys get involved, it usually means that we’re at the top of the market,” said Andrew S. Rachleff, who teaches venture capital at Stanford and was a founder of Benchmark Capital, the venture firm.

Mr. Rachleff also questioned Google’s reliance on its algorithms. “There’s no analysis to be done when you’re evaluating a company that’s creating a new market, because there’s no market to analyze,” he said. “You have to apply judgment.”

Although even Mr. Maris compares venture investing to “buying lottery tickets,” Google says it has faith in its algorithms. At the same time, it is taking the unusual step of providing the chosen start-ups with access to its 28,770 employees for engineering, recruiting and business advice, and offering office space at the Googleplex and classes on building a business.

Mr. Page, who declined a request for an interview, has already promised Google Ventures $200 million this year and says a virtually unlimited amount is available, Mr. Maris said, as Google reconnects with its start-up roots. “I’ve had conversations with Larry when he says, ‘Do as much as you can, as fast as you can in as big and disruptive a way as possible,’ ” he said.

Google says its approach is paying off. One of its investments, Ngmoco, was acquired by a Japanese gaming company, DeNA, for up to $400 million, and another, HomeAway, for renting vacation homes, received a warm welcome from investors when it went public last month. A third, Silver Spring Networks, a smart-grid company, filed to go public last week.

Google Ventures invests in various areas — the Web, biotechnology and clean technology. It puts large amounts of money into mature companies, but it is also investing small amounts in 100 new companies this year.

To make its picks, the company has built computer algorithms using data from past venture investments and academic literature. For example, for individual companies, Google enters data about how long the founders worked on start-ups before raising money and whether the founders successfully started companies in the past.

It runs similar information about potential investments through the algorithms to get a red, yellow or green light.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=26765bf97a355e0d3c31d80aaa9a5f64

Filed Under: Business News Tagged With: , ,